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Joy
Williams

American novelist, short story writer and essayist

Joy Williams is the author of four novels. Her first novel, State of Grace was awarded a National Book Award and her most recent, The Quick and the Dead, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2001. She is the author of three collections of stories, as well as Ill Nature, a book of essays that was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for criticism. Among her many honors are the Rea Award for the short story and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Rights for The Visiting Privilege, Joy's new short story collection, are handled by Knopf.

CV

Book

Writer

Much like the divine, Williams’ prose is simple and brutal, thoughtful and haunting. A spare but startling book.

Booklist (starred review) on Ninety-Nine Stories of God

[T]hese stories are 100% Williams: funny, unsettling, and mysterious, to be puzzled over and enjoyed across multiple readings.

Publishers Weekly (starred review) on Ninety-Nine Stories of God

The most beguiling book of the summer is this little collection of 99 very short stories about God. The catch is that the brilliantly twisted Joy Williams is behind the stories, which means the Lord finds himself at a hotdog-eating contest or in line for a shingles vaccination. Mayhem, humor, and death mark this transcendent book.

Publishers Weekly (Best Books of the Summer) on Ninety-Nine Stories of God

Admirers of Williams―and anyone who treasures a story well told should be one―will find much to like here.

Kirkus (starred review) on Ninety-Nine Stories of God

I would follow the trail of Joy Williams’s words―always beautiful, compelling, and so wise―anywhere they led.

Chuck Palaniuk (Author of CHOKE and FIGHT CLUB) on Ninety-Nine Stories of God